My dear friends in Christ, welcome back! Today is a special Sunday, and I have a big warm welcome to all of you, especially because it’s the first Sunday of February. What a blessing! Let’s give God a big hand and rejoice for this wonderful time. Hallelujah!

I believe that February is an ordained, blessed month for you, for me, and for our families. You need to accept and trust that. As you start a new month, the world is in a chaotic state – everywhere you look, there are problems, if not many problems. But remember this: you need to look to February based on our theme for the year – the Year of Hope. God is our hope, and things will do better. We need to understand this.

In Jeremiah, we read that God has plans to bless His people. You are a part of this because you are God’s people. You need to understand that you cannot have circumstances – you cannot let situations take your hope, take your faith away.

So today, I’m going to do something that I rarely do, but today I’m going to do it. I’m going to invite you to read a prayer that will be on the screen very soon with me. Okay? This prayer affirms your trust in God for this month that you’re just starting. So I’m going to put a prayer on the screen now, and for those of you online, you can see that as well. What I’m going to do is read it once, and then if you agree with that prayer, you’re going to read it the second time with me. I don’t want it to repeat just because I’m reading it, so I’m going to read it, and then just follow along with me. Don’t say anything, just say it if you agree with that prayer.

This month, I will be incredibly blessed because this is God’s will for my life. I claim, now by faith in the name of Jesus, what is mine as a child of God. I claim God’s Shalom for my life, for my family, for my church, and the places I work and live. I accept and trust God’s plans for health, prosperity, and a future. My life will change for the better in this new month, and I will be able by God’s grace to be a greater blessing to those around me, in Jesus’ name.

Well, if you see the beginning of this verse, verse 17, you see how he introduced that prayer, how he followed along, mentioning that it is in Christ that you dwell in the grace of God. But you need to be rooted in Christ, grounded in love in order to understand what God has for you and for the body. And then, in Jesus Christ, we – that comes to verse 19 – we can be filled with all the fullness of God.

This all fullness of God is Jesus Christ in your life. So actually, when you want to be full of God to experience God’s fullness, it’s through Jesus Christ. You have Jesus Christ, you are complete, you’re whole – nothing else is missing. If you live with Jesus and follow His commands, you’re done. You need to understand this.

Paul’s prayer to the Ephesians at the high note is that you may be filled with the fullness of God. So God intended, God hopes, I may say, that you’ll be filled with His power, with His fullness. How are you going to do that? Through Jesus Christ. It’s a done deal. It’s possible because Jesus has died on the cross for you.

So I want to be full of God? Come to Christ, learn about Him. Now let’s move on and ask this question: What does it mean to be filled or full of something? Right? I mean, let’s take God out now, let’s take Jesus out now, let’s just think logically: What does it mean to be filled or full of something?

Well, friends, to be filled with something means to be under its control. This means to have what fills you become the influencer in your actions or behavior. Whatever fills your life will dictate your life. Whatever you allow to be the power in your living will dictate your actions. Are you following me? And so that is the breaking point – that’s why Jesus said you cannot serve two lords, two masters. You cannot.

Being Full of God vs. Being a Christian

Sometimes we have Christians who are born Christians because they’re born into a Christian family, but they don’t know anything about God, they don’t know anything about Jesus. Let’s talk about followers of Jesus Christ. When someone wants to follow Jesus Christ, you need to be serious about it. By serious, I mean being committed to it, being committed to learn what the Lord has to teach you. Because by learning that, you’re going to be a blessing, and before being a blessing, you’re going to be blessed, which is actually what we intended, right?

The Danger of Being “Filled with the World”

Ephesians 5:18 expresses that being full with something: “And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit.” Just to give you an idea, when they were filled with something or full of something, that will take control of us, that will dictate what we do, who we are, and so on and so forth.

One passage that we could use is this: The exhortation of the man of God said, “Please be careful not to let yourself go towards alcohol.” That’s what he was talking about here – deal with the Holy Spirit. Well, Jesus said, “Don’t let the love of the world fill your life, because if the love of the world is in your life, you don’t love God, then God will not love you.” You see? You need to be filled with God, you need to be filled with Jesus.

How to Be Filled with God

And how can I do that? Well, you’re the one who needs to do it – no one else can do it for you. You need to submit yourself to God. You need to see how much attention, how much worth I’m giving to other things and not to God. Those things will dictate your desire to live and how you live and how you behave in life.

To be full with the fullness of God is to be conscious of God and submit to His presence and strength. I’m repeating myself here because you need to understand that. You see, friends, God is such a wonderful God. He wants, He is your Father in Heaven, He’s your best friend, He’s your *ounselor, He’s your lawyer – He’s everything for you. But because of that, because you know, we – God does not require us to do sacrifices and terms like we’re doing in all the religions. If we talk about religion now, other people, they do things physically, right? They need to go to certain places, they need to act like this or act that. Some religion, they ask people to dress according to the day – “Right, some days you need to dress like this, some days you need to wear this color.” Well, you know, so many things going on in religion.

God is not interested in that. He wants you to be a living sacrifice. But because of that, we relax, we get lulled, we feel like “God is love, and because God is love, He’s just get my whatever I want to give to Him.” No, no, no. You’re mistaken. You are mistaken. God is God, and God is a fire, a consuming fire, as the Bible says, and He is the Almighty God who kindly take you in as His child. But He deserves respect, and He deserves honor, and He deserves reverence. And so you need to understand that although God does not force you to do anything, He expects you to be holy, He expects you to walk in holiness, He expects you and me to do what He says in His word.

The Challenge: Be Fully Committed to Jesus

So don’t take it easy. It’s not easy to be a believer because you’re doing this for God – you’re not doing this for me, you’re not doing this for your spouse, you’re not doing this for your neighborhood, you’re doing this for God. So it’s between you and Him, and He looks at your heart – we look at the outside, God looks at the inside. So you need to be careful with that because we need to do our best.

When I say “be careful,” it’s not to bring fear to you. What I mean is an exhortation – we need to “Hey, wake up and do better for God!” He’s our God, He deserves the best.

“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” (Philippians 4:8)

My dear friends, let me encourage you to start this month by desiring to be full of Jesus, and to be like your Heavenly Father. There’s no other way – it always starts with the desire. It’s all it starts with – the desire. If you do not desire to be closer to Jesus Christ, you will never be. Please pay attention to this: it always starts with the desire. And the Holy Spirit is the one who sparks that desire in us. He shows us the desire to pray, He ignites the desire to read the Bible.

The Call to Action

So I encourage you today: have the desire. If you don’t have the desire, ask God to give you the desire. Approach Him, talk to Him, bless Him instead of just asking. Stop by and bless God in your prayers. Don’t say, “I don’t have time to pray.” You do. Do like me – I have a very interesting schedule, so what I do, I pray as I walk, I pray as I drive. Find time to pray. Use the time to pray.

My dear friends, be filled with the fullness of God. Turn to someone and say, “Please, you say this: My prayer is that you’ll be full of God.” That’s our prayer for you online as well – that your life will be full of Jesus Christ. Of course, Jesus Christ and God – we interchange that. That you’ll be able to show Jesus Christ, to show God everywhere you go by your living, by the standard of your living, by the way you talk to people, by the way you present yourself.

Let me bless you, and I’m going to ask a link to close with a word of prayer:

The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you shalom.

So that you can be full of God. And the people of God said, “Amen!”